Channel 4 programme downloads

[RogerS]

But...who should care?

I can't speak for legislation in the US but as faras the EU goes there are very strict rules regarding monopoly positions and commercial restrictions which is behind the onogin anti-trust case against MS by the EU. MS are in a monopoly position as far as DRM is concerned...at least from my fairly basic research.

Yes...Mac owners certainly do have a beef against the providers such as Channel 4 and Channel 5 for adopting the Microsoft DRM but, again as far as I am aware, it is the only one that is out there...which brings us back to anti-trust and monopoly positions.

Nor is it a question of 'how many programs are there that only run on the Mac etc'. That issue affects a minority I would argue but the CRM issue affects millions and restricts their access to a large chunk of online material.

 

[MikeW]

Seems like this places Apple in a good position then to create a better, cross platform widget. And if they chose to, the MS version might go the way of the dodo.

Monopoly in a free-enterprise society is one of those issues which to me make no sense. MS, Apple and whoever should be allowed to freely create whatever they desire and not be forced to adapt to other platforms.

In this case, it seems a valid violation against MS would exist only if they prevented a widget from Apple from being able to operate.

But we won't probably ever know. I seriously doubt Steve Jobs/Apple care. I mean, why should they? If governments can force a company to adapt to their competitor's platforms, it saves millions in development costs for those who elect to not meet some supposed need of their customers.

Perhaps the proper solution to also protect the finiancial investment of MS would be to license the technology to Apple for them to adapt it for their platform. Do you think Apple would pay MS for this? I also doubt that.

Just who should bear the development costs and reap the rewards?

Take care, Mike

 

[ByronBlack]

Mike, the point you are missing is that these companies are not forced to use the MS only proprietry system. They could have chose a more accessible solution that works independant of platform (RealPlayer, Flash, Quicktime etc.., but they didn't, its lazy on the part of the content provider.

But as i've mentioned in my previous post, it doesn't bother me specifically as i'll vote with my mouse and find content elsewhere.

And for what it's worth, Apple do have their own content driven systems, which are as it happens superior to media player, namely Quicktime and the itunes delivery network. AND these are compatible with Windows as well as OS X.

 

[MikeW]

Mike, the point you are missing is that these companies are not forced to use the MS only proprietry system. They could have chose a more accessible solution that works independant of platform (RealPlayer, Flash, Quicktime etc.., but they didn't, its lazy on the part of the content provider.

But as i've mentioned in my previous post, it doesn't bother me specifically as i'll vote with my mouse and find content elsewhere.

And for what it's worth, Apple do have their own content driven systems, which are as it happens superior to media player, namely Quicktime and the itunes delivery network. AND these are compatible with Windows as well as OS X.

Hi Byron--unless I misunderstand the above, I made the same point earlier. That is, the problem should be with the content provider's choice, not MS. All MS did was creat a widget. Apple does have their own, which while I am not sure I agree is superior, certainly does work fine for the given application. And, yes, it is cross-platform.

The provider made a choice which seems to exclude some people who would otherwise use their service. But it wasn't the evil MS who did that. It was ultimately the Beeb.

What MS did do is make a computer program and its codex, etc., which seems to only work with Windows. My point would be, so? Last I knew there are many programs which are designed for Windows which do not work on the Mac and vice versa.

What I haven't seen answered in this thread is why should MS be forced to make their schema work on a Mac?

And while people are thinking of a reason to that question, why is it that PC users don't attempt to force Apple to make things compatible for the PC via legislation?

Take care, Mike

 

[ByronBlack]

Mike

As far as I know there aren't PC Users taking legislation against Apple, but then I don't know every PC user individualy so this a moot point.

I'm personaly not againt MS - I beleive this is Rogers argument, not mine, BUT MS are inconsistent. For example, they make MS Office for the MAC, they make Internet Explorer for the Mac, and they also make MSN Messenger, and Windows Media Player. SO if you are going to the effort of making those tools, why then restrict them so that you can't use them afterall? I'm refferring to Media Player here of course. Apple doesn't restirct it's use of iTunes or Quicktime for any platform that it's available on.

As i've said before, I don't personaly care about MS DRM as there are plenty of alternatives out there, my argument is more with the content prodividers, and they have a very closed minded policy to this considering there are open soure or cross platform choices.

My Solution would be for all the non-compatible users such as mac, linux, amiga (there are still some of the poor buggers out there) etc.. To lobby these providers to enter the spirit of non-proprietry delivery, in this day and age there is no need to exclude anyone on the net, it goes against it's whole ethos.

But I feel that MS should also enter the spirit of non-proprietry, for a business point of view, you then open up to a lot more of your customers, this current sort of behaviour is a clear attempt of monopolising an area of business where they leverage their vast influence over content providers to use their tools. Vista is only going to make this worse, but with the advent of the intel Mac and the growing maturity of Linux, hopefully these companies will realise there are real world alternatives, and we wont always be at the mercy of MS.

Rant over (good conversation by the way!)